-LRB- CNN -RRB- -- The Chinese-French painter Zao Wou-ki once told me that painting expresses the thoughts we struggle to put into words . Faced with this challenge , `` It 's easier to learn English ! '' he joked , his wit shining through , even though Alzheimer 's disease had already begun its slow , relentless onslaught on his mind .

Zao , widely regarded as one of the foremost Chinese contemporary painters of the 20th century , passed away at his home in Switzerland on Tuesday at the age of 93 .

Born in Beijing in 1920 , he formed part of the second generation of Chinese artists to turn westward in their search for inspiration . Encouraged by the French-educated Chinese artist Lin Fengmian , his teacher at the prestigious Hangzhou National College of Art -LRB- today the China Academy of Art -RRB- , he relocated to Paris in 1948 . Although he did not know it at the time , the move would be permanent , due in part to the rapidly changing political situation in China .

Apart from brief trips abroad , Zao would remain in France until the year before his death , one of the few Chinese artists from his generation to emigrate to Europe . Embraced by France , he was elected to the prestigious Academie des Beaux Arts society in 2002 and received the Legion of Honor in 2006 from then-president Jacques Chirac .

For Zao and his contemporaries , Paris represented the source of modern art . Living there meant direct access to the paintings that he had until then only encountered as black-and-white reproductions in art magazines . An oil painter by vocation , he immersed himself in the riches that surrounded him -- heading directly to the Louvre on the very day he arrived in the city .

Meanwhile , with the assistance of his friend and mentor , noted poet and painter Henri Michaux , and blessed with the warm charm and wit that would impress me decades later , Zao cultivated an extensive circle of fellow artists and cultural figures . In just a few years , he established himself as an integral member of the postwar French art world .

Zao worked hard to find his artistic voice . At first he made a determined effort to distance himself from ink painting -- the medium most closely associated with the Chinese painting tradition -- and subject matter that might be construed as overtly Chinese . He wished to be appreciated on his own merits and not to fall victim to stereotype .

His breakthrough , however , came with his 1954 masterpiece `` Wind , '' a painting that was both his first purely abstract work and a return to his origins : the inky black forms rising in two wavering columns are abstractions of oracle bone characters -- the most ancient of Chinese scripts .

In the decades that followed , Zao committed himself fully to abstract painting , rarely using even figurative titles after 1959 . Instead , he titled his works with their date of completion , marking their entry into the world . The lyrical qualities that defined him as an artist appeared early on , first in his oil paintings and later in his ink paintings , after his reengagement with the medium in the early 1970s : oscillating planes of color , light , and shade met , collided , and diverged , skidding across the surface of his works .

The apparent disorder of his paintings concealed an underlying structure , sometimes described as Daoist in nature , which bore striking parallels to a similar balance between order and chaos found in Chinese traditional painting . In Zao 's case , this phenomenon is perhaps best understood as a self-statement : the artist 's insistence on his personal and aesthetic identity in the face of the vagaries of borders and time .

Zao 's given name , `` Wou-ki '' -LRB- or `` Wuji '' in the standard Hanyu Pinyin romanization used in China -RRB- , means `` no boundaries . '' No single phrase better encapsulates the union in his person and art of the two often disparate cultures and aesthetic visions of France and China .

`` French thought and Chinese thought are not the same , '' he told me . `` It 's hard to translate between them . Sometimes you must wear yourself out trying to understand . Painting must express these feelings . ''

An artist friend once asked about my research . Hearing that I studied Zao Wou-ki , he grew suddenly pensive . `` Zao Wou-ki , '' he mused , `` his work is n't representative of either Chinese or French art . '' `` Yes , '' I answered . `` He represents himself , and that is enough . ''

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Chinese-French painter Zao Wou-ki died Tuesday at age 93

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Zao was regarded as one of foremost Chinese contemporary painters of the 20th century

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Zao was uniquely able to combine cultures , aesthetic visions of France and China in his work